UK Mail posts small profit
THE Royal Mail is losing 250m letters a year to its new upstart competitor UK Mail.
Business Post, the courier company that launched UK Mail 12 months ago to deliver post and packages for utilities and banks to their customers, said today that the fledgling business is ahead of targets and is already turning a small profit.
Business Post founder and chairman Peter Kane said UK Mail had turned over £10m in its first trading year to 31 March, and had grasped 1% of the corporate postal market.
‘We are encouraged by the prospects for UK Mail which remains on track for 3% market share by the end of its third year,’ said Kane.
Business Post is one of a clutch of courier companies which are aiming to snatch market share away from the Royal Mail as the postal market is fast-tracked toward liberalisation.
Rival operations have already been set up by DX, the former mail subsidiary of the broken-up Hays conglomerate, Deutsche Post and by TNT, an arm of the German group’s Dutch counterpart.
But while Business Post was lauding the performance of one new business it reported a halving in profits at another new operation, its pallets business – delivering to the retail and building industries – which it bought less than two years ago.
Group pre-tax profits came in 7% better for the year at £20m on turnover up 21% at £233m. The dividend, which is up 7% at 19.2p, is paying out more than £10m, most of which goes to the founding family.
